


you don't have to say i love you (to say i love you)

by leifstroganoff



Category: Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist (TV)
Genre: (zo and max are only there for a minute but they're still there), 5+1 Things, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Roommates, but its better to be safe and say something, i am simply a ho for them both being in love with each other and not realizing it, not Really or at least i hope not bc its something i do, than not say something and someone not be okay reading it ykyk, the one time is like Within the last thing but i think it still counts rip, tw for eating disorders i think
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-17
Updated: 2020-05-17
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:14:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,107
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24229468
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leifstroganoff/pseuds/leifstroganoff
Summary: five times tobin shows leif he loves him without saying it + one time leif just says it
Relationships: Tobin Batra & Leif Donnelly, Tobin Batra/Leif Donnelly
Comments: 11
Kudos: 60





	you don't have to say i love you (to say i love you)

**Author's Note:**

> so uhh i was kinda going through it when i wrote this so some parts of this are more angsty than others and i do wanna give a trigger warning for the first one, he talks abt not eating bc of headaches/straight up forgetting to eat and idk if thats explicitly an eating disorder thing but i think its better to say something abt it than not  
> hope yall enjoy and stay safe <3

1.

Tobin tries not to notice how exhausted Leif looks when he comes into their apartment twenty minutes after him. He also tries not to note that it usually only takes him ten minutes longer to bike home than it does for Tobin to ride the bus. But as he’s clearly noting it, he’s also clearly failed his goal of trying not to note any of this. 

Leif immediately slumps down wordlessly on the couch next to him, leaning against the armrest to prop up his head and subtly rub against his temples where Tobin suspects a headache might be forming. They stay there in a companionable silence, just watching the documentary that had come on after the episode of Ancient Aliens Tobin had been watching, until the documentary ends. Well, Tobin would use the word ‘watching’ very lightly, because every couple of seconds, his eyes would dart worriedly over to his best friend, who’s seemed more out of it than usual since walking in the door. 

He isn’t _worried_ , or at least he doesn’t want to be, but it does give him a weird feeling that Leif’s been entirely silent since he got home. He doesn’t think either of them have been this silent in the same room as each other for this long since the week of what they now only refer to as ‘ _the_ fight’ when Leif was in college. He was about to open his mouth and attempt to break the tension when Leif made a move to get up.

“I think I’m gonna go to bed early ton-” 

His sentence cuts itself off early when he squeezes his eyes shut, stumbles forward, and catches himself on the armrest of the couch. 

“Dude, are you good?”

“Yeah, I just, uh, head rush. Wasn’t expecting that.” Tobin doesn’t think he’s ever smelled such bullshit coming from his best friend.

“Bro,” Tobin gently grabs his arm, pulling him down to sit next to him again. “Did you eat today?”

“Yeah,” He nods, but when Tobin lets his answer ring in the air instead of acknowledging it, he looks down at his hands twisting in his lap and swallows heavily. “No. I mean, _technically_. I had breakfast.” 

“That doesn’t count and you know it.” 

“It’s really obnoxious when you do this, y’know?”

“Care about you? Not wanna see you almost pass out in our living room? Geez, so sue me, I don’t like seeing you blatantly not taking care of yourself.” 

“You know I’m not… doing it on purpose, right? Like, I don’t… I’m not…” Leif opens his mouth to try and get another half-formed sentence out, but it doesn’t make it out of his throat; instead, he just drops his head into his hands and sighs. “I just - I worked through lunch and I got a headache and then I just wasn’t hungry. This isn’t, like, a _thing_.” 

Tobin feels bad for pushing, but the worry sitting in his gut wins out just a little bit over not wanting to piss Leif off.

“Can I make you something?”

“No, don’t worry about -”

“I’m sorry, I misspoke, I’m _gonna_ make you something. Sit tight.”

2.

Tobin hasn’t seen Leif this drunk since college, he thinks. Or it’s at least been a couple of Spellaversies since he’s let himself get this loose. Tobin thinks he should probably also be having that much fun, but he’s really not feeling it and he wishes he at least knew _why_ . When Zoey proposed that the four of them (her, Max, Leif, and himself) go out for drinks after work to try and bond the team, neither of them could think of an actual reason to say no. They didn’t really dislike Zoey _or_ Max strongly anymore and they could both use the stress relief.

So, Tobin is dumbfounded when he finds himself sulking at the table they’d settled down at with Zoey while Max and Leif talk and laugh on the dancefloor; both of them are _technically_ dancing, if you count stepping from side to side and moving your arms as dancing.

“Hey, you okay?” Zoey nudges his arm and he jolts from where he’d zoned out staring into the center of the packed club (and he should’ve expected that part, at least, it’s a club in San Francisco on a Friday night). 

“Yeah, I’m more gucci than I’ve ever been.” He says, sounding definitively not gucci, eyes drifting back to where Max was smacking Leif’s chest with a loud laugh that he thinks he definitely shouldn’t be able to hear from where he is.

“Yeah, you seem like you’re very… _gucci_ .” Zoey makes a face and rolls her eyes before following his gaze to what he was staring at. “What? Are you scared Max is gonna _steal_ Leif? Trust me, you’ve got nothing to worry about on the best friend front.” 

And _damn_ , how did she just read him like that? He’s about to respond indignantly, adamantly refusing that he would even _consider_ Leif ditching him for Max when the boys in question sloppily slide back into each side of the booth, Leif draping his arm across the back, tactless enough with the booze in his system to let his hand hang where it would rest on Tobin’s shoulder. 

“This is _fun_.” And now he’s leaning into Tobin, close enough that he can smell the shitty vodka on his breath. “Thanks for inviting us, Zo-oolander. That’s not,” He stops to stifle a small laugh. “That didn’t work.”

“You tried, dude.” Max laughs and so does Zoey, and Tobin at least forces a smile and a ‘c’mon, dude’. 

Overall, he does end up enjoying himself - it’s nice to get to know Max and Zoey outside of the office and he’s never gonna complain about hangout time with Leif, but he still feels _weird_ when he’s dragging Leif out of the cab they took home, carrying him more than Leif is actually walking up the steps to their apartment. 

When he manages to unlock and open the door, lock it again, _and_ get Leif to change out of his work clothes and put on some pajamas, he feels like freakin Hercules, no matter how exhausted he feels now. 

He helps Leif wash his face (because ‘I can’t just not do it tonight, Tobin, do you know how dry and oily my skin’s gonna be if I skip even one day?’ rings in his head from so many late nights that he knows it’s better to just make sure he does it than let him pass out and rest) and makes sure that he gets into bed okay; as he’s turning out the light and he’s about to close Leif’s door behind him, he hears his friend’s soft voice.

“Tobes,” He seems more vulnerable than Tobin’s seen him in recent years and, while still _definitely_ drunk, he seems much more aware than he was on the way home. “I don’t…” A sigh falls from his lips as he sloppily tries to push himself up to a sitting position, wrapping his arms around his knees. “I don’t really wanna be alone tonight.” His voice is small and it looks like he regrets saying it as soon as the words come out of his mouth. “I’m -” He lets out a small laugh, but this time it sounds more like a whimper than anything else. “I’m so drunk, forget it.”

Fuck that noise. His vibes have been in the figurative shitter all night and if his best friend in the world doesn’t wanna be alone tonight, he’s damn well not gonna be alone tonight. Tobin doesn’t quite acknowledge if he makes the decision to crawl onto the other side of the bed because _he_ doesn’t wanna be alone either. 

3.

So, maybe the impulsive offer of a cross-country road trip wasn’t a good one, after all. In Tobin’s defense, he did not think critically about it at all, he simply heard Leif talking to his brother who had accidentally grabbed several boxes of his stuff from childhood and college from storage when he moved out and thought ‘aw, shit, a cross country road trip sounds dope and we should go look through your old shit’. It was Leif who _agreed to do it_. That was the real idiot move here, right?

So, now they find themselves on the way back from New York with four boxes of things Leif admittedly _did not need_ or even really want. The first leg of the trip, from California to New York, had actually been pretty fun. They’d split the driving up pretty evenly, they had plenty of snacks and water, Tobin made a _banging_ playlist, and they made sure to stop at a hotel halfway through to get plenty of rest. 

It’s on the way back that they realize _maybe_ they’re getting a little too old for cross country road trips to be fun or, at the very least, they should’ve stayed in New York a little longer to make it worth it. The only snacks they have left are sugar free gummy bears, Leif’s now listening to a medical podcast, and he’s also insisted on driving until they cross the Nebraska border. 

Tobin’s pretty bored, but at least he had grabbed several of Leif’s comics that they’d found in his old stuff. Even then, Batman comics that he knows he’s already read can only be interesting in a moving car for so long. It’s when he looks to his left and sees Leif’s pale face with bags under his eyes and a well placed yawn that he decides to speak up. 

“Pull over. Let me drive for a while.” 

“What? No,” Leif splits his attention between glancing at Tobin and keeping attentive eyes on the road. “I said I’d drive till the hotel and then we can rest and we’ll get a fresh start tomorrow.”

“Yeah, I know that’s what you _said_.” Tobin can’t help but to smile a little at his friend’s predictable resistance. “When you said that, you didn’t look like you were about to pass out behind the wheel. Let me drive.” 

Surprisingly, Leif doesn’t resist past that, he just silently gets off at the next exit, pulling over into a gas station that they get some better snacks from, too. By the time Tobin’s pulled back onto the highway, Leif’s soft snore from where he’s leaned the passenger seat back is all he can hear, despite the soft tunes he’s opted to play through the radio. 

4.

Tobin finds himself watching Leif at his desk, something he’s not been too unfamiliar with doing recently. It’s only them and Zoey left at the office, but she’s got her headphones on and he honestly doesn’t think Zoey cares enough about them to notice Tobin staring at his best friend and observing the tension in his shoulders, the way he places his head on one of his hands, and the way he looks like he’s about to fall asleep standing up.

It doesn’t take a long time of watching him to realize that he needs to go the fuck home and get some sleep. But getting Leif himself to admit that and go home? That’s a much harder feat. 

“Dude, how much sleep did you get last night?” Tobin casually stands up and leans forward onto Leif’s standing desk; usually, he’d be pissy if Leif glared at him like he is now, but his concern far outweighs any pettiness right now. Plus, he can at least justify that Leif is grumpy because he’s _not gotten a full night’s sleep in such a goddamn long time._

“Does it matter?” 

“Uh, yeah, when you look like you’re about to collapse, it kinda does.” 

Leif sighs, removing his glasses and placing them on the desk, features instantly softening.

“Tobes, I’m fine.” His response is met with a scoff. “Seriously, dude, I just - I -” Maybe Tobin would be more inclined to believe him if he could think enough to get a full sentence out or if what did manage to come out of his mouth wasn’t punctuated with a serious yawn and a palm to rub at his eye. What does come out sounds quiet and vulnerable, and he can’t really decide if that’s better or worse than the glare he was receiving a minute ago. “I think I’d be resting just as much at home as I am here.” 

And _that_ kind of breaks Tobin’s heart. “Dude, come on. We can play Castle Crashers or something if you’re not gonna sleep, but you can’t stay here, grinding till you die or pass out or whatever.”

When Leif doesn’t respond immediately, just stares at his desk wearing that stubborn pout he does when he’s trying not to cry (and that doesn’t exactly make Tobin feel any better, either), he raises his arm and places his hand in what he hopes is a comforting gesture on Leif’s shoulder.

“I’m not… I’m not gonna keep you up to play video games just because I can’t get my brain to function right.” 

“You’re not gonna keep me up. I’m making the choice to stay up so that you’re not miserable for the next eight hours. And you can’t stop me, so don’t try. You’re also not riding your bike home, I’m _not_ about to let you crash from exhaustion on the way home. Come on. Grab your stuff.”

Begrudgingly, he does. Zoey notices them leaving and says goodnight, and before Leif can really process it, they’re on the latest bus home. They play Castle Crashers until they can’t really focus, opting to put on a Netflix movie instead. By the time the opening credits of the movie have started playing, though, Leif’s head has fallen to rest on Tobin’s shoulder and his breathing has evened out into the soft breaths of someone fast asleep. Even if he wanted to, Tobin couldn’t bring himself to move Leif when he was finally getting some sleep; plus, he looks so young and peaceful, and what kind of monster would he be if he risked waking him up now?

5.

After knowing Leif since he was eleven and living with him for several of those years, Tobin considers himself to be pretty in tune with his best friend and how he’s feeling. Right now, he can confidently say that Leif’s vibes are _not good_ . The main space of the apartment, which Leif usually keeps _immaculate_ (‘Tobin, you never know when someone’s gonna come over, I don’t want them to think we’re slobs’) has laundry and small trash strewn throughout and Leif’s room, which is usually kept _even more_ immaculate, looks much the same.

For once in his life, too, it isn’t Tobin that caused any of the mess. Leif just seems _sad_ and apparently when Leif’s vibes go down the drain so do all of the rules about cleanliness that he’s established. He’s never seen his roommate like this, and frankly, he doesn’t like it. It doesn’t help that Leif’s stayed late at the office every day this week, coming home close to midnight, and immediately crashing. Maybe, Tobin thinks, he’s just too tired to clean. 

So, he looks at the clock and makes a decision. His boy’s clearly not doing well, and existing in this messy space could not be helping that state of mind so he decides to spend the rest of his Thursday night restoring the apartment to its previous immaculate state. At first, he hesitates at the idea of cleaning up in Leif’s room without him there, thinking it might cross a line of privacy (another virtue held close to Leif’s heart), but ultimately decides the benefits far outweigh the risks; the benefits being that it might make Leif feel even a little bit better, the risks being that he might be a bit pissy with him for the rest of the week. Somehow, he thinks he can live with that. 

By the time Leif finally gets home, he’s sitting on the couch (with all coats and ties that had been laying on it properly removed) playing Borderlands with Leif’s favorite incense scent and candle burning on the coffee table in front of him. 

“Dude,” Leif looks almost dumbfounded as he collapses onto the couch next to him. “Did you,” His eyes land on his open door, looking at the tidied up room just past it. “Did you deep clean the apartment?”

“Yeah,” Tobin gets to a point in the game he can pause, shifting his attention to Leif next to him. “You seemed, uh,” Leif’s face looks so earnest and appreciative that he has to look away to gather his thoughts. “You didn’t seem like you were doing too great, bud. I just wanted to help.”

What he doesn’t expect is to hear Leif sniffle and to look up to him wiping tears off his face. 

“Woah, _bro_ , don’t - don’t cry. I really did just want to help.”

“Shut up.” Leif takes a second to collect himself, wiping the rest of the tears away. “They’re not - They’re good tears, dude. This was really nice, I’m just, uh, very overwhelmed by weird emotions right now, just give me a minute.”

“Oh. Cool. Uh, I’m glad.” 

Leif’s gazes fixes on the incense and candle on the coffee table, taking in a deep breath and inhaling the scents, before turning his head slowly towards Tobin.

“Hey, Tobes.” His voice is calmer than he’s heard it in months. “I love you.” 

“Like, in a bro way?”

He shakes his head softly, yet still calm. He seems like he’s never been sure of anything like he’s sure of this.

“So, like, in a not bro way?” 

“Sorry. If that’s weird or a line I shouldn’t cross, because I can walk backwards now and we can never talk about it again, but I, uh, I do. And I felt it a lot just now and I really wanted you to know.”

Tobin thinks about it for a second. He thinks about how long they’ve known each other and how comfortable he makes him feel. He thinks about casual touches and times he’s felt like his heart was exploding and times that he’s felt nothing but at peace in Leif’s company. He thinks about everything they’ve shared and every time they’ve helped each other when no one else would and _okay_ , he decides, _this makes sense._

“No, it’s cool.” Tobin makes eye contact with Leif for the first time since he’d broken it a minute before. He reaches slowly to rest his hand on top of Leif’s where it lays on his knee. “I think I love you, too.”

**Author's Note:**

> leave a comment for my undying love and respect <3


End file.
